HABITAT: This year the first ‘yellow’ Ophrys flowered in a different way compared to earlier years: both flowered directly out of the stem. Normally the stem grows until a few centimeters high and then the flowers open. This year the flowers didn’t wait for the stem to grow higher, they just appeared almost from the base of the stem or from the rosette.

NAMES: In this – and earlier – blogs I usually use the shortest version of an orchid name; as in this case Ophrys sicula or only ‘sicula’ instead of a full name like: Ophrys lutea ssp. sicula (Tod.) Dan. I realise that this can lead to confusion. Clearly I don’t know – and I don’t mind when I meet an orchid in the field – if an orchid is a ‘real’ species, a subspecies or just a variety, that’s for others to decide; there are ‘wars’ between orchid researchers about this – and almost every other – orchid subject. But I get sad when an orchid I and almost all orchid researchers and orchidologists know today under the name ‘sicula’ – the early flowering, small, yellow Ophrys which is related to Ophrys lutea, has to be renamed ‘galilaea’. Who says so? Well, Pedersen, H.Æ. & Faurholdt, N. (2007) & Kew Gardens at first, now (the proposals of) HENNECKE M. & MUNZINGER S. (2014) also try to rename this orchid. I understand why some orchidologists wanted to use the name ‘minor’ because it is a small version of the bigger Ophrys lutea. But ‘galilaea’? Oh yes, wasn’t that the subspecies or even variety which was found in 1892 in Palestine and described by FLEISCHMANN & BORNMULLER in 1923? And what has this species or even the proposed name to do with Ophrys sicula from – for instance – Lesvos? ‘Tipota’ we say here in Greece, nothing. The only ‘real’ Ophrys (lutea ssp) galilaea photographed was I think from Israel, Zikhron ( R. PETER on 12-02-1983) and in 2012 maybe the photograph from MUNZINGER S, made in Sicily in 2012. And that was also totally different from the Ophrys sicula or even from the Ophrys phryganae growing on Lesvos. Also BAUMANN’s photograph of Ophrys lutea ssp. galilaea made in N-Israel, Haifa on 14-03-1994 is not in heart and soul a real ‘sicula‘; his photograph of Ophrys lutea ssp. minor was closer to it. I could publish a book about all the names and written ‘tangle’ of names this small Small Yellow Mirror Orchid has been called through the years and centuries. ‘Lutea’ was the most common, ‘sicula’ a good second; ‘galilaea’ the third and ‘fusca’ & ‘minor’ last. And then I don’t include all the homo- and heterotypic synonyms (30), hybrids and variations (12) which are described. So let me make a list of the Ophrys lutea taxa in the recent Mediterranean – Greece – Aegean islands orchid literature taking 15 years ago as the starting point:

In the ARTICLES:DEVILLERS, P., BAETEN, F., DEDROOG, L., DEVILLERS -TERSCHUREN, J. & FLAUSCH, A. ‘Orchids of Lesbos : Distributional and Biogeographical Notes.’ Natural. belges 91 (Orchid. 23): 206-245. 2010.Group of Ophrys lutea:Ophrys siculaTINEO (s.l.)
‘The plants (of Ophrys lutea collectives) we saw on Lesbos during our three visits, in spite of a rather large spectrum of altitude-corrected flowering dates, appeared to belong to a single taxon clearly referable to O.sicula s.l. in view of its consistently flat labellum. In detail, however, these plants are quite different from those we have seen in Sicily, peninsular Italy, the Dalmatian archipelago, the Ionian Islands and continental Greece.
The Lesbos plants also have, in general, a very broad yellow margin to a labellum that curves up at the rim. They certainly belong to a unit that is specifically distinct from Italo-Sicilian and continental Greek populations. The limits of its range and thus the existence of names to be applied to it remain to be analyzed. Ophrys sicula s.l. is the most widespread Ophrys on the island and we have seen small to medium-sized stations in most of the south-eastern quadrant and in the Andissa-Eresos corridor in the west.’

HENNECKE M. & MUNZINGER S. (2014): Die neue systematische Gliederung der Gattung Ophrys: subgenus Ophrys section Pseudophrys. Ber. Arbeidskrs. Heim. Orchid. 31 (1): 99-126. Untersektion Luteae:Ophrys lutea Cav. 1793Ophrysgalilaea H. FLEISCHMANN & BORNMULLER 1923:
‘”Sicula” is according to BAUMANN & KÜNKELE (1986) a synonym of Ophrys lutea subsp. minor, and by this they meant a small but characteristic ‘”lutea“, which frequently occurs in Sicily: labellum circle-round, middle- and side lobes overlapping or so close together, that – from above – it looks like it doesn’t have a opening between the lobes. Front of the middle lobe always yellow. It is a variety of the nominative form, only smaller, otherwise identical.’

BOTTOM-LINE: There is a lot written about the name of this small Ophrys lutea member, the most used is Ophrys sicula. I don’t know where HENNECKE & MUNZINGER went to see ‘their’ Ophrys galilaea but I don’t think it was Israel or Lesvos. Here on Lesvos we have ‘only’ the above described ‘minor’ variety from BAUMANN & KÜNKELE and of course Ophrys phrygana. Also all the other authors – see list above – just described this ‘minor’ variety. I think HENNECKE & MUNZINGER - like PEDERSEN & FAURHOLDT – were far away when they renamed this orchid, maybe even in another land…

*Homotypic (literally “with the same type”. In botanical nomenclature a homotypic synonym (or nomenclatural synonym) is a synonym that comes into being through a nomenclatural act.

*Heterotypic (literally “with a different type”. In botanical nomenclature a heterotypic synonym (or taxonomic synonym) is a synonym that comes into being when a taxon is reduced in status (“reduced to synonymy“) and becomes part of a different taxon.